During the last few decades, interplanetary probes such as Magellan, Voyager 1 and 2, and the Viking Landers have sent us astounding images from the depths of space. Journalist, filmmaker, and artist Michael Benson carefully reviews these images, from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) archives as well as others, and then digitally enhances and manipulates the original raw data. Flawless and beautiful, the pictures look as though they were captured while Benson himself floated high above the surface of each planet. By studying his amazing images, we gain a deeper understanding of Jupiter’s mystifying moons and the varied landscapes of Mars and Venus. More images are now being retrieved from the Cassini orbiter and Huygens probe, which arrived at Saturn in 2004. This data will greatly enhance our knowledge of the distant planet, with its many moons and unmistakable rings. Two years after landing on Mars, NASA’s two rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, are still sending astonishing panoramic landscapes of Mars’ wind-blown deserts. Benson, the author of Beyond: Visions of the Interplanetary Probes, will examine and refine many of these otherworldly images as he attempts to reveal the secrets of our planetary neighbors. >>More on Michael Benson

Contents	40 framed color and black-and-white photographs, text and graphic panels, labels
Supplemental	Companion book, education and promotional resources
Participation Fee	$7,500 per 8-week booking period
Size	250 running feet, est. (80 running meters)
Crates	7, est.
Weight	To be determined
Category	Science
Security	Moderate
Shipping	Prorated; $5,904
SITES Contacts	Michelle Torres-Carmona, 202.633.3143 (Scheduling) Devra Wexler, 202.633.3138 (Content/Design)
Tour Begins	Spring 2008

Dates		Host Institution	Status
3/8/2008	5/4/2008	Monmouth Museum, Lincroft, NJ	Booked
5/24/2008	7/20/2008	Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, Tucson, AZ	Booked
8/9/2008	10/5/2008	Cleveland Museum of Natural History, Cleveland, OH	Booked
10/25/2008	12/21/2008		Call for Availability
1/10/2009	3/8/2009		Call for Availability
3/28/2009	5/24/2009	Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, MA	Booked
6/13/2009	8/9/2009		Call for Availability
11/14/2009	3/28/2010	Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, Santa Barbara, CA	Booked
4/17/2010	8/29/2010	Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago, IL	Booked
9/18/2010	11/14/2010	Daura Gallery, Lynchburg College, Lynchburg, VA	Booked
12/4/2010	1/30/2011		Call for Availability
2/19/2011	4/17/2011		Call for Availability
5/7/2011	7/4/2011		Call for Availability
7/23/2011	9/18/2011		Call for Availability
10/8/2011	12/4/2011	Stauth Memorial Museum, Montezuma, KS	Booked

Beyond: Visions of Interplanetary Probes, Harry N. Abrams, 2003. Hardcover. $22.00. Author Michael Benson spent years compiling and digitally processing interplanetary images. In Beyond, Benson has pulled together the most spectacular of them into one volume that presents these photographs for the first time as art. The book shows us how modern science has revealed the astonishing beauty and mystery of the solar system and its awe-inspiring worlds far beyond any places human beings have ever directly observed. >>Order this book from Amazon.com

Extraordinary Planetary Landscapes Captured in New Smithsonian Photography Exhibit Media only:    Jennifer Schommer 202.633.3121 Public only:   202.633.1000 or TTY 202.633.5285 12.7.07 The views of the solar system that one can see while standing here on Earth are often impressive, if not mindblowing. But from the inner solar system to its outer reaches, the closer and more detailed views of Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn and the other planets that have been achieved during the Space Age show unparalleled beauty and visions difficult to fathom. This otherworldly view, collected during 40 years of robotic space missions and then processed into breathtaking images, is the subject of the new Smithsonian traveling exhibition Beyond: Visions of Planetary Landscapes. The exhibit paints a rarely seen and mesmerizing portrait of our solar system’s diverse worlds and their moons. Featuring 35 large-scale (ranging from 3 feet to 5 feet in width) framed prints containing 59 individual photographs, all digitally processed by artist Michael Benson, the exhibition debuts March 9, 2008 at the Monmouth Museum in Lincroft, NJ. Beyond will remain on view through May 4 and then continue on a national tour through 2010, traveling to cities such as Tucson, AZ; Cleveland, OH; Lynchburg, VA; Worchester, MA; Montezuma, KS; Santa Barbara, CA; and Chicago, IL. The exhibit’s astonishing views of the solar system’s planets and their moons come primarily from NASA and European Space Agency missions. Benson mines planetary databases for his source material; then, using various techniques, including a mosaic or collage process, he pulls together the images to create seamless photographs of unprecedented clarity and realism. Throughout the process, Benson strives to stay true to the natural and breathtaking reality of space. “My goal was to locate, digitally process and print some of the most extraordinary sights ever captured,” Benson said. “I view the photographic legacy of these missions as being a chapter in the history of photography.” While humans have not set foot on any other planet and have not visited any satellite except Earth’s moon, robot creations have traveled to nearly every planet in the solar system, even landing on such varied surfaces as those of Mars, Venus and Saturn’s moon Titan. Through the photographs and data these probes send back to Earth, viewers can soar to the borderlands of the solar system without leaving the safety and comfort of this planet. Beyond shows that familiar geological formations and the atmospheric disturbances that take place on Earth also can be found on neighboring planets: the erupting volcanoes of Sicily find their counterpart in the lava eruptions of Jupiter’s moon Io; the moon’s deep craters are displayed alongside the “cantaloupe” terrain of Neptune’s moon Triton; the stormy clouds of Greenland can be seen alongside the “dust devils” of Mars. The exhibition is divided into several sections, including the Inner Solar System, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. The show’s compositions include rare pictures of the sand dunes on Mars, storms on Neptune and the fiery eruptions of the sun. Beyond: Visions of Planetary Landscapes was created by Michael Benson and organized for travel by the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service (SITES). The exhibition is accompanied by Benson’s award-winning book Beyond: Visions of the Interplanetary Probes (Abrams, 2003), which includes a forward by science-fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke. A paperback edition of the book will be released in spring 2008. Michael Benson is a journalist and award-winning filmmaker (Predictions of Fire, 1995). His journalism has been published in The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Atlantic and The Washington Post, among many other publications. He recently relocated from Ljubljana, Slovenia, to New York City.